Category Archives: Internet Detectives

It’s the longest-running criminal case in U.S. history, which is why, more than 30 years after the classic miniseries Fatal Vision aired on NBC, Investigation Discovery is taking another look at the Jeffrey MacDonald murder saga with the new film Final Vision.

Starring Scandal’s Scott Foley as MacDonald, the Green Beret and Ivy league-educated doctor who was convicted of the 1970 murder of his pregnant wife and their two daughters, and Brothers Sisters alum Dave Annable as Joe McGinniss, the bestselling author MacDonald sought out to help prove his innocence, Final Vision takes another look at MacDonald’s murder trial and the relationship between the men.

What began with MacDonald giving McGinniss extended interviews and full access to his defense team and the trial

When writing mystery novels, author Harry Dolan keeps track of two different things: what the reader thinks is happening and what is really happening.

“You want to play fair with the readers as much as you can, so there needs to be clues about what’s really going on. But the clues can’t look like clues or they’ll give everything away. It comes down to control: You have to reveal things at the right time, not too soon or too late,” explained Dolan, 51.

A native of Rome, NY, currently living in Ann Arbor, Dolan is the author of the David Loogan mystery novels: “Bad Things Happen,” “Very Bad Things” and “The Last Dead Girl.” The first two books occur in Ann Arbor.

His latest, “Crooked Hat,” is set in Detroit and introduces private eye Jack Pellum.

When writing mystery novels, author Harry Dolan keeps track of two different things: what the reader thinks is happening and what is really happening.

“You want to play fair with the readers as much as you can, so there needs to be clues about what’s really going on. But the clues can’t look like clues or they’ll give everything away. It comes down to control: You have to reveal things at the right time, not too soon or too late,” explained Dolan, 51.

A native of Rome, NY, currently living in Ann Arbor, Dolan is the author of the David Loogan mystery novels: “Bad Things Happen,” “Very Bad Things” and “The Last Dead Girl.” The first two books occur in Ann Arbor.

His latest, “Crooked Hat,” is set in Detroit and introduces private eye Jack Pellum.

When writing mystery novels, author Harry Dolan keeps track of two different things: what the reader thinks is happening and what is really happening.

“You want to play fair with the readers as much as you can, so there needs to be clues about what’s really going on. But the clues can’t look like clues or they’ll give everything away. It comes down to control: You have to reveal things at the right time, not too soon or too late,” explained Dolan, 51.

A native of Rome, NY, currently living in Ann Arbor, Dolan is the author of the David Loogan mystery novels: “Bad Things Happen,” “Very Bad Things” and “The Last Dead Girl.” The first two books occur in Ann Arbor.

In the second episode of the first season of the TBS show Search Party, someone a little bit older than our protagonist, Dory, asks her a terrifying question: “What do you do?” Knowing how much weight the answer to that question is supposed to carry — how succinctly it is supposed to sum up her entire identity — she looks down at the lid of her deli coffee cup and grasps for a few words that do not sound totally pathetic. “I, uh, work as an assistant … to a lady who’s … married,” Dory (Alia Shawkat) stammers, then lets it go with a sigh. “It’s pretty meaningless. I’m just tired of things that don’t matter.”

Search Party — which returns to TBS this Sunday for a triumphantly ante-upped second season — was one of the best new shows of last year, and, perhaps more than any television show since Girls, you could hardly read a headline

In the second episode of the first season of the TBS show Search Party, someone a little bit older than our protagonist, Dory, asks her a terrifying question: “What do you do?” Knowing how much weight the answer to that question is supposed to carry — how succinctly it is supposed to sum up her entire identity — she looks down at the lid of her deli coffee cup and grasps for a few words that do not sound totally pathetic. “I, uh, work as an assistant … to a lady who’s … married,” Dory (Alia Shawkat) stammers, then lets it go with a sigh. “It’s pretty meaningless. I’m just tired of things that don’t matter.”

Search Party — which returns to TBS this Sunday for a triumphantly ante-upped second season — was one of the best new shows of last year, and, perhaps more than any television show since Girls, you could hardly read a headline

The epigraph to Graeme Macrae Burnet’s third novel, The Accident on the A35 (Saraband, £12.99) – “What I have written is false. True. Neither true nor false” – could serve equally well for any work of fiction, but Sartre’s words are especially germane to what might be called Burnet’s metafictional method. His Bloody Project, shortlisted for the 2016 Booker Prize, was presented, Defoe-like, as a set of found documents, including a memoir written by an accused murderer in 1869 and an account of his trial, with an introduction by Burnet.

The Accident on the A35 brings us the recently discovered second novel by Raymond Brunet, the French author and suicide whose first work, The Disappearance of Adèle Bedeau, was similarly translated and introduced by Graeme Macrae Burnet. An afterword commends the astute marketing of the original French edition, speculates on the autobiographical nature of the tale and even samples

Television is the most important thing in my life (sorry fiancé, family and dog). I love TV. But lately I’ve been into entertainment in audio form.

Here are my favourite podcasts, not to be confused with “My Favourite Murder”, which is one of my favourite podcasts.

“Serial”

Host, Sarah Koenig, dives into a 1999 case where Adnan Syed went to jail for the murder of his ex-girlfriend. The podcast takes you on a journey of the case and straddles the line of is he or isn’t he innocent in a way that makes you interested, curious and ready to jump into your amateur detective uniform.

“My Favourite Murder”

What? You thought someone who still keeps their Neopets alive couldn’t be into true crime? Hosted by two female comedians, this podcast is equal parts funny and terrifying. Each week the women talk about a different murder. Their tagline?